Too Much Focus On Camera Phones

from the focus-on-the-crime,-not-the-technology dept

There's been all this fear-mongering about the dangers of people using mobile phones to take pictures of people without their knowledge, so the second someone is actually caught trying to do so, the press turns it into a story worth covering. The point here, though, shouldn't be to focus on the fact that this school crossing guard/playground supervisor was trying to take pictures of these students with a camera phone, but the fact that he was in the girls bathroom at all. It should be obvious to just about anyone that a male adult does not belong in an elementary school girl's bathroom. Furthermore, by this point, anyone with half a brain should be suspicious if someone has pulled out a camera phone in a public restroom. It certainly sounds like that was the case here. The guy seems to have been caught pretty quickly. While reaction to this story is likely to be more calls for banning camera phones - that's the wrong response. Clearly, the normal methods worked here. People saw right away that this guy was doing something wrong, and he was apprehended.
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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 16 Jan 2004 @ 8:06am

    Too much focus???

    Why do we need to have camera phones? What is SO important that we MUST take a picture and upload it immediately? How did society survive all these millenia without this ability?

    Get a life! Hang up the phone, and talk with the people around you!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      alop, 16 Jan 2004 @ 9:18am

      Re: Too much focus???

      Everyone is so willing to blame technology for problems. It's not technology it's the peolple using it.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 16 Jan 2004 @ 2:50pm

      What a Luddite...

      "Get a life! Hang up the phone, and talk with the people around you!"

      The people around me are assholes, you insensitive clod!

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        PhuzzyLogic, 16 Jan 2004 @ 3:01pm

        Re: What a Luddite...

        Well, we don't "Need" anything but food and water. That light you turn on to see past dark, like going to potty? BAHH! Who needs it! (i do, well my little toe does at least)

        As to the topic, it is the start of Video Conference over mobile phone. Well, it is still quite a ways off.

        But I am with you in one way... Get Off The PhonE!! Drive your car!! (And yes, I did see a woman driving and taking pictures with her phone... Thank God I do not carry a ballistic weapon.. Bang,Bang,Bang,Bang,Bang,Bang...reload...Bang...)

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    David, 16 Jan 2004 @ 1:09pm

    RE: Too much focus???

    Well, it isn't something that's NEEDED. I don't have one.
    But it can be a really enjoyable thing - I hear stories all the time.
    One example: a friend was graduating - her family was sooooo far back from the stage they couldn't see a thing. So she took photos of the stage and the proceedings around her and instantly sent them directly to her family way out in the "cheap seats".
    Necessary? Of course not. But that doesn't mean there aren't uses and people don't want one.
    Is a TV necessary? Is wi-fi necessary? Are Game Boy's necessary? No, but suggesting that having them is kind of dumb may get you some odd looks.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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